SteveWhile a professor at my university, I have heard several talks on YEC. In each case, the speaker was a lay person without a formal education in a scientific field; a mechanical engineer; an educator (secondary), or -- most distressfully-- an impostor, i.e. falsified Ph.D. credentials. No doubt there are "real" scientist doing YEC in the sense of educational background, but in all presentations or even printed arguments that I have yet observed, real science -- i.e. inclusive data, hypothetical-deductive-emperical methodologies-- is woefully lacking.ICR wins because they are "REAL" scientists whose interpretation of science
is consistent with the priority of Scripture (from a literal gramatical
historical interpretive view) not the other way around.
You want theI think your charge should be aimed at the YEC camp, for there it finds its mark. I believe most professional scientists hold to a critical realism that demands a real world out there that either empirically accords to scientific investigation and conjecture or doesn't; independent of Scripture.
scriptures to conform to your view of science. They want to see science in
a way that is consitent with scripture. It is simply a question of which
you place first in your world view. Most Christians choose the latter view
and therefore you find them somewhat unreceptive to your perspective.
I agree that, an "interpretation of science that is consistent with
the priority of Scripture" would be mistaken since it falsely assumes that
Scripture's intent is to communicate propositional truths about nature.
Additionally, any non-contextual reading of verse is really detrimental
to revelation. All attempts to "read back" modern science -- YEC, OEC or
TC-- is simply spurious. God spoke to Moses in the language of Mesopotamian
cosmology which he well understood, e.g. Emuma elish.
George A.
-- George Andrews Jr. Assistant Professor of Physics LeTourneau University andrewsg@letu.edu